


Freefall

by SkyisGray



Category: Captain America - All Media Types
Genre: 2014 SteveBucky Bookclub, Canon Divergence, Cave, Cuddling, Hydra (Marvel), M/M, Steve falls after Bucky, Winter Soldier Steve, Wolves, surrender
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-05
Updated: 2014-07-05
Packaged: 2018-02-07 14:45:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,658
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1902966
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SkyisGray/pseuds/SkyisGray
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Steve lets go and falls after Bucky.  He'll do anything to keep Bucky alive at the bottom of the gorge.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Freefall

**Author's Note:**

> This was an interesting prompt. I wanted to think of ways that Steve could become the Winter Soldier outside of the traditional brainwashing and reprogramming route.

The sound of metal sheering off of metal is sharp.  It reverberates in Steve’s ears for a second before Bucky’s screaming starts, and then everything is blurred and confusing and sudden. 

There’s not enough time to think, but Steve doesn’t have to think.  He’s always known that he would freely follow Bucky Barnes into the jaws of death, and his hands let go of the train on instinct before he’s fully cognizant of his decision.

Steve lets go and falls after Bucky.

He hears someone shouting above him, but all of his attention is focused on what’s below.  Bucky’s body twists and flips head over feet, and Steve knows the exact moment when Bucky sees him and realizes what he’s done. 

“NO!  You idiot!” Bucky screams at him.  His voice already sounds hoarse, and Steve reaches for him. 

Bucky’s wearing a lot of gear, but Steve is wearing more.  He’s also heavier than Bucky is (and isn’t that a head trip?) so he thinks that he can catch up to Bucky. 

“Grab my hand!” he shouts back, even though there’s yards between them.  Bucky flips again, and the rocks below are looking much closer than they did a moment ago. 

“The rope, Bucky!” he yells. 

“What?” Bucky yells back, his voice punched with terror. 

“Throw me the rope!”  He sees Bucky’s hands roam frantically over his body, patting himself down and searching for the thin coil of rope that Steve swears Bucky has in one of his pockets.  He saw him gear up just a few hours ago. 

Bucky finds it as his outline is consumed by the black, frozen river below.  There isn’t much time.  Steve opens his mouth to yell again when Bucky lets go of the rope’s end.  It seemingly flies towards Steve, moving slower than both of their bodies, and Steve gets a hand on it.  The resulting jerk makes Bucky howl in pain as his arm is wrenched forward, but neither of them let go. 

“I’m coming!” Steve shouts as he starts to pull himself forward, hand over hand.  He gets closer and closer, and finally, he can reach out and get a hand on Bucky.  Bucky grabs him back in relief and in fury, and Steve looks into his wide, white eyes for what might be the last time.   

“We’re going to die!” Bucky tells him. 

“Maybe!” Steve agrees.  Then he pulls Bucky flush against him and twists so that he’s underneath. 

He cradles Bucky’s body as they crash though the ice of the river.  It burns, and he feels himself shatter apart. 

 

He wakes up, practically frozen, a few minutes later.  Bucky is treading water with one hand and pulling Steve with the other, and his lips are already an alarming shade of blue. 

Steve tries to move his arms, or his legs, or anything.  They’re not responding yet.  Even his jaw barely wants to move. 

“You should leave me,” he slurs.  “ ‘m too heavy.” 

“S-so f-fucking stupid,” Bucky complains as he continues to put his own life in jeopardy to pull Steve out of the water.  His teeth chatter, and Steve tries to remember if that comes pre or post hypothermia. 

Bucky drags up him the river bank and then struggles to hoist Steve over his shoulder.  It hurts to be carried this way – it jostles the points of the broken ribs against his organs, and he knows that he’s slowing Bucky down immensely. 

“Put me down and save yourself,” he mumbles again. 

“Y-you shut the hell up,” Bucky replies angrily. 

That’s when Steve blacks out again. 

 

When he groggily slips back into consciousness, he’s aware that it’s very bright.  He also feels very naked, and there’s something shivering violently behind him. 

“Bucky?” he asks blearily, not putting the pieces of information together in any way that makes sense.  He thinks, distantly, that they fell.

“W-we neverrr have t-to talk ab-bout this a-gain,” Bucky mumbles against his cold ear. 

“W-what’s happ-ppening?” he responds.  He blinks at their surroundings again and realizes the incredibly bright and beautiful light is coming from a fire mere inches from Steve’s nose.  Fire is a normal part of their lives when they’re driving around Europe and making camp outside of Hydra bases, but Steve is distantly aware that they’re supposed to be surrounded by the shuffles and grunts of the Commandos.

They also aren’t supposed to be stripped down and pressed against each other like this.  Steve’s as bare as the day he was born, and he’s starting to feel the pressure points of Bucky’s hard muscles and sharp bones against his back.  He’s fairly certain that it wouldn’t feel like this if there were still layers of cotton and leather between them. 

“W-we’re in a c-c-cave.  We were wet-t, s-s-so I m-made a fire and und-dressed us.”  Steve looks around to confirm Bucky’s story, and the light from the fire is dancing over dark and craggy surfaces.  He can’t see the mouth of the cave, or the back of it for that matter, from where he’s lying.

The fire, he realizes, is burning that black, chalky, foul-smelling block that Howard made for the Commandos and insisted that they take everywhere they went.  It’s supposed to be a water-proof, quick-accelerant fuel for emergency fires, even though the Commandos have always just collected wood and put the “science fires” off for true emergencies.

True emergencies like this one, Steve realizes when his short-term memory kicks back in and he realizes what happened.  Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, he’s amazed that he and Bucky are still alive.  That Bucky was unhurt and lucid enough to find them shelter, get this fire started, and then shuck their wet, frozen uniforms off to conserve body heat. 

“Are y-you w-warming up?” Bucky asks him several minutes later.  He moves the arm that’s draped over Steve’s waist up to his bicep and starts rubbing hard, probably trying to make sure that the blood is circulating in Steve’s limbs. 

“I’m s-t-tarting to,” Steve tells him.  “Switch p-places with m-me.  You n-need to be c-closer to the fire.”

“No,” Bucky argues automatically.  He presses his face forward into Steve’s shoulder and rests it there, and Steve feels something slide into his belly that has nothing to do with the heat sources at his front and back sides. 

Steve’s been leading his men around Europe with his shoulders squared from bravado, but in truth, most of it is forced.  He believes in what they can do, and he’s seen the proof a dozen times, but he’s felt off-balance ever since…

Well, to be honest, ever since Bucky left Brooklyn. 

Now, though, this is familiar.  Steve closes his eyes and can’t distinguish between this cave in Austria and his rickety bed back home.  He can’t count the number of times Bucky had crawled into bed behind him and wrapped Steve’s shaking body in strong arms and warm heat to keep Steve from freezing in the night.

They’d never quite been naked, though.  Naked is a new element, and it’s one that honestly frightens Steve a little.  Once he warms up more and his body starts to have reactions, he probably won’t be able to hide his sickness from his best friend.  And considering that Bucky’s just saved his life, he owes Bucky more than a startling revelation and the ensuing shame and awkwardness. 

He clenches his jaw as Bucky’s hand slides to his chest and starts rubbing there.  His fingers dip lower to rub friction into Steve’s abdomen, and he catches Bucky’s hand, holding it above the fire. 

“Y-your f-fingers are c-cold.  Making it w-worse,” he lies.  Bucky mumbles an apology behind him. 

 

As the cold dissipates, Steve becomes more aware of his broken and bruised body knitting itself back together.  His aches have pains, as his mother used to say for far lesser injuries, and he’s terrified to ask Bucky what _he’s_ broken. 

Bucky doesn’t have the serum, and even though he was on his feet to get them from the river to this cave, he passes out from the pain as soon as his nerves thaw out. 

Steve shakes Bucky awake and forces some jerky into his mouth. 

“Chew,” he commands.  Then he wanders to the head of the cave to scoop up a handful of snow.  He brings it back to the fire and holds his cupped hands close enough to melt the snow, fighting the natural instinct to pull his singed hands back. 

Then he holds his cupped hands to Bucky’s mouth and urges him to drink. 

He knows that Bucky’s going downhill when Steve shifts him to lie on his back, and Bucky  moans through his unconsciousness when his weight is placed directly on his spine. 

Steve thinks, and he prays, and he comes up with a solution that will either save Bucky or kill him faster.  Despite the fact that it’s still bitterly cold in the cave, Steve is sweating as he pulls a knife out of his discarded pocket. 

Erskine obviously hadn’t told him anything about this, and he wishes he understood his serum better.  But it hadn’t been something he asked a lot of questions about before, and there was no one to question after.  

He deliberates about the best places on his and Bucky’s bodies to cut, and he finally slices open his own palm and makes a second incision high on Bucky’s leg.  He avoids the femoral artery, but Bucky’s leg starts oozing blood before Steve can put the knife down, so he drops it ungracefully and clamps his open palm over Bucky’s wound. 

It’s slippery, and he has no proof that it’s even working.  He has to re-open his own cut every ten minutes or so, no matter how deep he makes it.  His body has enhanced healing where Bucky’s doesn’t, so he has to keep this up until something happens. 

He thinks he’s been keeping vigil all night, cutting and bleeding and compressing, when Bucky finally wakes up with a soft gasp. 

“What are you doing?” he slurs, his eyes spying Steve’s bloody hand clasped over his own leg from under sluggish lids. 

For the first time, it occurs to Steve that maybe Bucky didn’t _want_ the serum.  Didn’t want to be altered through innovation that way Steve was. 

But what’s done is done.

“I’m trying to heal you,” he explains.

“Shit, you’re bleeding,” Bucky says as he struggles to sit up.  Steve doesn’t think he was capable of that the day before with whatever is (was?) broken in his back, and a grin crests over his face. 

“What?” Bucky demands.  Steve beams at him.  “Seriously, what’d you do?” 

“Emergency blood transfusion,” Steve says as he finally peels his hand away from Bucky’s leg.  Both of their wounds are closed and sticky, and Bucky’s jaw drops open when he realizes what it means. 

He stares at Steve for a minute, and Steve stares back, the grin slowly sliding off his face.  Then Bucky looks down at himself. 

“Where’re my muscles?” he jokes, and Steve laughs out loud as Bucky reaches forward to poke his stomach and turns it into a viscous tickle. 

“Stop!” Steve gasps through his laughter, writhing far too close to the fire.  Bucky finally lets up, and they collapse against each other on the ground like puppies. 

It’s weird because they’ve nearly died a handful of times in the past twenty-four hours, but Steve is happy.  He has Bucky with him, and they’re both alive, and it somehow feels like everything will be okay if he can keep hold of both those things. 

“What are we going to do now?” Bucky mutters into his neck some time later.  Steve shrugs, his shoulder jostling Bucky. 

“Whatever we have to, to stay alive and together.” 

“I know that,” Bucky says with annoyance.  “I meant what are we going to _do?_ ” 

And Steve shrugs again.  He dares to place a hand on Bucky’s lower back, holding him against Steve’s side, and Bucky doesn’t move. 

“Figure it out tomorrow,” he says quietly as he drifts off to sleep, tired from his bloody vigil over Bucky. 

 

“Steve, you need to wake up now,” he hears.  He doesn’t know how much time has passed, and he tries to stretch his muscles.  They’re pinned down, and they don’t move easily. 

“Steve, you need to wake up now,” Bucky says again, and it’s the tremor of fear in his voice that lights the flicker of awareness in Steve’s brain. 

He opens his eyes, and Bucky is completely on top of him.  They’re still naked, and his mind wants to do something with that before he recognizes Bucky’s stance as protective. 

Slowly, he leans his head back and looks in the direction that Bucky is looking. 

From his upside-down angle, he sees at least five gray and snarling wolves standing by the mouth of the cave.  They look as wary as Steve immediately feels, and he swallows as he feels Bucky’s heartbeat pounding against his own. 

No one, wolf or human, moves. 

“We have some guns over by the clothes in the corner,” Bucky whispers. 

“Okay, I’m going to throw you to the corner and then fight them off while you get the guns,” Steve whispers back. 

“No,” Bucky hisses.  “You’re not fighting wolves, bare-handed and bare-assed.”

“We don’t really have a choice, Buck,” Steve argues back.  One of the wolves growls at their hushed discussion, so Steve shoves Bucky off him before springing to his feet. 

The wolves correctly interpret it as a sign of hostility, and they spring.  Steve kicks one in the throat and punches another, barely avoiding the teeth.  Behind him, Bucky fires one of the Colts into a maw and then jumps forward to stand shoulder-to-shoulder with Steve. 

As he hands off another handgun, Steve takes it as an opportunity to push Bucky behind him. Even with the impromptu serum transfusion, Bucky doesn’t have Vita Rays or whatever it was that gave Steve his heightened strength.  Also, Bucky’s come closer to dying that Steve has in this cave.  So there’s no way he’s not going to make protecting Bucky his top priority.

It would probably be easier if Bucky would stop trying to do the same for him and just stand behind Steve, dammit. 

“Stop,” he snaps as he kicks another wolf and then shoots it in the heart.  He’s already taken a few of them out, and he suddenly realizes that there’s more of the than he originally counted. 

“Stop protecting me,” Bucky snaps back.  He fires at the wolves closest to them and hits them all dead-center. 

Unfortunately, the blood and dying wolves whip the remainders of the pack into frenzy.  Somehow, despite the close quarters of the cave, he and Bucky get separated.  One second, Bucky’s at his elbow, and the next, Bucky’s several feet ahead of him. 

One of the wolves nearly gets Steve’s junk in its fangs, and Steve’s “woah!” makes Bucky turn and smirk.

Then Bucky’s on the ground, screaming, and panic settles solid and white-hot over Steve.  He doesn’t remember killing the wolves around him or getting to Bucky, but he’s instantly at Bucky’s side, firing his Colt into the brain of the wolf tearing at Bucky’s arm. 

He empties his clip and then grabs Bucky’s gun.  When that’s empty, he twists the necks of the last two wolves, and then spares a panting moment to look around the cave at the furry carnage before dropping to his knees and practically crawling to Bucky. 

There’s a jagged-edge hole where most of Bucky’s left bicep used to be, flaps of skin debating whether they want to fall off or stay attached.  Blood and muscle decorate the floor, and as Steve crouches at Bucky’s side, he sees the white of bone deep in Bucky’s arm. 

Fighting the urge to vomit, he moves his gaze up several inches to Bucky’s scared, pained face.  

“Don’t suppose the serum will fix this,” Bucky tells him shakily as he grits his teeth hard enough to bite through his bottom lip.  He opens his eyes and meets Steve. 

“Sorry,” he says miserably, and Steve wants to shake him. 

“Whatever it takes to stay alive and together,” Steve recites as he gets to his feet and stumbles over to their clothing to get something to wrap Bucky’s arm with.

“I think that’s too late now,” Bucky whispers as Steve starts to tear off strips of his undershirt to first tourniquet and then cover the gaping hole in his best friend.  He realizes he’s crying as Bucky moans at the pressure against the wound, and he wipes his eyes on his bare arm, forcing himself to be the brave face now. 

“We’re getting dressed and we’re getting out of here.  I think the blood will attract other predators.”

“That’s sharks, you moron,” Bucky tells him.  His eyes flutter closed, and Steve slaps him gently. 

“Stay awake,” he orders.  Bucky’s eyes close again, and Steve hits him harder.  “Stay the hell awake, Bucky.” 

“Steve, be realistic.  The only way I’m surviving this is if we miraculously manage to find a hospital in the next cave.  Take the rations and the ammo, and get out of here.” 

Anger bleeds into the panic that’s still riding him, and Steve leans forward to get into Bucky’s face. 

“No,” he says with the entire force of his personality behind it.  Steve Rogers doesn’t leave Bucky Barnes behind to bleed out in a cave; there’s only one person stupid enough to think he would. 

Bucky’s eyes flick over the features of Steve’s face and settle on his mouth.  It’s like a punch, and Steve is leaning down to kiss him before he knows what his traitorous body is doing. 

Bucky’s lip is bleeding freely from where he bit it clean through.  It’s gross and salty, but Bucky’s mouth is warm and firm beneath it.  It’s like everything else about Bucky – you sometimes have to get through a layer of crassness and machismo to see the loving and generous man beneath. 

Steve pulls back, mouth wet with saliva and blood.  Bucky stares at him in shock, and Steve feels his gut turn with humiliation and fear before the moment catches up to him and he realizes that Bucky kissed him back. 

“What’d the fuck you do that for?” Bucky asks, sounding as scared as Steve feels.  He starts to shake under Steve’s hands, and there’s so many potential causes for that.  Steve just grips his shoulders tightly.    

“I wanted to,” he admits.  “I’m so sorry.  I wasn’t ever going to let it affect you.”  Bucky closes his eyes, and Steve’s stomach sinks as he slaps him again. 

“Now I really don’t want to die,” Bucky tells him when he opens his eyes again and locks them onto Steve’s.

“You will live to give me a hard time about this, I promise you,” Steve says as he lets go of Bucky to yank his own clothes on hurriedly. 

“I really won’t,” Bucky tells him, trying and failing to get to his feet.  “And not just because I’m not going to make it.” 

Steve finishes dressing and helps Bucky stand and pull his own pants, jacket and boots on.  Things like underwear and t-shirts get left in the cave with the bodies of their canine attackers; there’s no time, and they won’t provide any warmth anyway. 

Steve scoops Bucky’s seizing body into his arms as Bucky goes into shock, and he barrels out into the gorge.  Bucky’s off-hand comment about the hospital has given him an idea; if there are any people around, there might be a village.  And if there’s a village, there might be a doctor. 

He doesn’t let himself think about Bucky’s other off-hand comment about not giving Steve a hard time.  Despite his own words, he knows that Bucky probably will die in his arms.  It’s what pulsed under his skin and gave him the courage to finally kiss him, and it’s what prevents him from analyzing Bucky’s meaning now. 

He can’t take hope from Bucky’s words, because he can’t let himself think that Bucky might love him back the same way that Steve loves him, only for Bucky’s heart to stop.  The hope and pain would blind him, and right now, he needs to be completely focused.  He needs to move quickly and find people and save his friend. 

“Keep fighting, Bucky,” he whispers to the shaking weight in his arms.  And Bucky does.  Through some combination of Steve’s shared serum and Bucky’s renowned stubbornness, Bucky doesn’t stop shaking, and Steve doesn’t stop searching. 

 

Hours later, Steve finds a footpath and follows it up a steep, craggy hill to a road.  He follows the road until they find a convoy, and Steve shouts for it, not really caring which army they’ve stumbled across. 

Black-masked figures spill out of the tanks, pointing guns, and Steve has to set Bucky down to raise his own arms.  He’s not overly surprised that it’s Hydra; if he’s had any hope that his own country was searching for them, then he’s just assumed that Hydra was also looking. 

There’s a lot of harsh German being shouted around him, and it’s unclear who’s in charge.  Steve keeps his arms raised and looks down at Bucky.  He’s nearly the same color as the snow, and the entire arm of his blue coat, the same color as his eyes, is soaked with blood. 

“I’m Captain America!” he yells above the German shouting.  “I’m surrendering!  We’re surrendering to you!”  Two of the Hydra goons move forward to prod at Bucky, who doesn’t react.  “He needs medical attention!” Steve yells.  More Hydra goons advance and grab Steve’s hands to restrain him.  More of them gesture over Bucky, and then one of them takes out his gun. 

“No, no, he has the serum too!” Steve yells.  That makes the goons pause.  “We both have it!  Erskine’s serum.  Like Schmidt!” 

The goons debate in German, and then one of them points a gun at Bucky’s head again.  Steve screams and breaks his restraints.  He pushes forward and lays his hand over Bucky’s face, feeling the barest hint of breath tickle his wrist.  He doesn’t think his hand will actually stop a bullet, but it’s symbolic. 

“You help him,” he enunciates, chest heaving.  “And we surrender to you.  Two American super soldiers.  Captain America and Bucky Barnes.  Shoot him, I kill you all.” 

There’s more debate among the goons, and Steve isn’t sure whether or not they’ve understood him.  It’s only when four agents gingerly lift Bucky’s body and exercise care with their cargo as they load him into the back of a truck that Steve relaxes.  He climbs up voluntarily after Bucky and sits protectively beside him on the floor of the truck. 

A ring of Hydra goons surrounds them and keeps their weapons pointed at the Americans, but Steve isn’t planning on doing anything stupid.  He said that he’d surrender to Hydra if they helped Bucky, so that’s what he’s going to do. 

Bucky’s going to be livid.

But as long as they’re both alive, and as long as they’re together, Steve doesn’t care. 

 

They’re taken to a Hydra base that Steve doesn’t remember from Schmidt’s map.  It’s either very new or very minor, but it’s swarming with agents all the same. 

Apparently this is where Hydra agents go when the Howling Commandos destroy their main posts. 

They bring a stretcher for Bucky, and Steve violently insists on following him.  He’s not going to let Bucky wake up alone and strapped to another table in another Hydra prison;  he’s going to follow his friend.

He feels a faint stirring of remorse when the white-coats crowd around Bucky, prick him with needles, and freely run their hands over him, but then they stop the bleeding and hook him up to a breathing machine.    

And an hour later, Bucky opens his eyes. 

Steve regrets nothing.  Let his country paint him as a traitor; this is worth it. 

Bucky blinks up at him, subdued by the drugs they’re pumping into his veins.  He looks alarmed at his surroundings, but Steve rests his hand against Bucky’s brow and speaks quietly into his ear. 

“I promised you you’d live,” he says.  Bucky’s wide-eyed look turns into a glare, and Steve sighs. 

“I know, I know.  But we’re going to be okay.” 

 

When Bucky passes out again, Steve finally follows their captors to whoever is in charge.  The man speaks English well enough, and he looks like he’s won the lottery when Captain America sits down before him. 

“Save Bucky’s life,” is Steve’s only request. 

“We may need to amputate the arm.  It is already quite infected, and we cannot replace all of the muscle that was torn away.”  Steve’s heart sinks, but he nods. 

“Now, let us talk about what you can do for us, Captain,” the man says with a gleam in his eye. 

“Save Bucky’s life,” is still Steve’s only request.  The man hears what he doesn’t vocalize.

_And I will do whatever you want._

“You don’t have to do this,” Bucky tells him.

“You’ve told me that every day for five years.  You must be pretty stupid if it hasn’t gotten through to you yet that I do,” Steve replies.  He adjusts his black combat leathers and checks his gun. 

“You don’t.  They’ve got their trackers and their shut-downs in me, but there’s nothing holding to you Hydra,” Bucky tells him as he touches the star painted on his own, metal arm. 

“You think there’s nothing holding me to Hydra?” Steve says with a wry smile. 

“You know what I mean,” Bucky scowls back. 

Steve steps forward and yanks Bucky’s mask off.  He pushes into Bucky’s space, touching their lips together and enjoying the light pressure before Bucky give in first.  He slides his tongue against Steve’s bottom lip and Steve opens for him, enjoying just this taste before a mission. 

He pulls back and runs his thumb over Bucky’s mouth, feeling the dip of the scar that was an open wound during their first kiss in that cave half a decade ago. 

“Everything holds me to Hydra,” he whispers, before he slides Bucky’s mask back into place.  He hooks his own mask around the back of his head, and waits for Bucky to indicate that he’s ready. 

Bucky finishes checking his gear and gives him a nod.  Steve picks the lock on the door that leads to the hotel below, and he brings up the rear as Bucky goes first, Glock held steadily in front of him, and ready for any surprises they encounter. 

The American scientist has four body guards.  Bucky knocks two unconscious with the butt of his gun and chokes a third into unconsciousness while Steve makes the fourth provide a fingerprint to open the door.  Then he smashes the man in the temple with his own weapon. 

The scientist is standing at the window with a drink in hand, and he starts when he sees them. 

“I’m guessing you’re the Winter Soldiers?” he asks with a set voice.  The liquid in his glass sloshes from side to side, the only tell for how scared he is. 

Bucky forces the man to his knees, and Steve pricks the needle into his neck.  He pushes the plunger, and seconds later, the man’s eyes flutter shut. 

“Let’s go,” Bucky says.  He’s already by the door and has his gun out in case additional security has shown up.  It’s unlikely; the informant only told Hydra that the scientist had four guards, but they aren’t in the habit of taking chances with each other’s lives.

Steve hoists the man over his shoulder and Bucky goes first again. 

“Clear," he says before they duck through the hallway and back up the staircase to the roof.  There’s a helicopter extraction coming for them in two minutes. 

So they leave the way they came. 

Together and alive. 


End file.
